Search Result

Search Tags: building security

Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson has said he wants to increase security at federal buildings. But the FPS, the agency responsible for doing so, may not be up to the task. GAO's Mark Goldstein said the FPS has a number of long-standing problems to solve before it can adequately protect anyone.

After a gunman opened fire at Canada's National War Memorial and Parliament, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said he wants to beef up security at federal buildings. But as Mark Goldstein, GAO's director of physical infrastructure issues, explained on the Federal Drive with Tom Temin, more security means a greater workload
for the Federal
Protective Service. Reports from the Government Accountability
Office show the small agency isn't always prepared for new threats.

The Federal Protective Service will no longer coordinate security at DHS headquarters on Nebraska Avenue in Northwest D.C. according to a May 1 memo from the agency's chief security officer to the undersecretary for management. The memo was brought to light Wednesday by members of a House Transportation and Infrastructure subcommittee at a hearing on the security of federal buildings. Rep. Lou Barletta (R-Pa.), chairman of the Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings and Emergency Management, cited the DHS memo as a possible sign that "confidence in FPS may be eroding" from within DHS.

Current and former federal employees, not hardened criminals, committed most acts of workplace violence, according to the Merit Systems Protection Board. The federal workplace was also more violent when compared with the private sector.

The Modified Infrastructure Survey Tool does not provide information about the consequences of security incidents at federal facilities, a GAO auditor said. As a result, agencies cannot effectively deploy countermeasures. Still, Rep. Dan Lungren (R-Calif.) said he was happy with FPS' progress in developing MIST.

Security checks at federal and military bases are a fact of life. But when it's a 100 percent effort, lots of people spend lots of time doing it, Senior Correspondent Mike Causey says. Many feds work a lot of voluntary overtime but how much is too much?